Search engine results are different for clients and freelancers

[the-right-writer]

After we were told by the moderators (then denied fervently) that the results were different for clients and freelancers, I checked it out. I have made comparisons for the last twenty days. I was using two different computers to catch the results in real-time because if you don't completely sign out, you get the freelancer results even though it says you are searching talent; it's not the same as what the client sees.

The moderator insisted I was wrong and told me to post screenshots. Screenshots only cover two freelancers and do not allow me to show the whole page. I can't figure out how to get the file posted showing the differences. Every time I have tried, it comes up as "edited for community guidelines." So, unless someone can help me figure out how to post the proof, you need to look for yourselves. The two searches are not the same.

I want an explanation, but I know I will never receive one from Upwork. It makes no sense to spend time/money to have two separate searches, yet there they are. Since Upwork won't tell us why, freelancers are, once again, left to try and determine what the geniuses that make up these ridiculous ideas thought they were accomplishing.

[tomzilla1]

Is it still an issue? I thought they fixed it. My biggest concern is the search result shouldn't show top talents on page 25... and then the $0 earnings, or the $1000 earnings are on the first 5 pages.

But one thing I do want to point out is, since I work on Google search everyday, Google has this thing called personalization, in other words, you might be seeing completely different results because of how Google or Upwork's search algorithm works. Using Google as an example, it uses more than 200+ signals in realtime to determine what's "best" for you. For example, if I have always purchased Brand ABC for shoes, for example, it's going to show Brand ABC shoes at the top whenever I search "buy shoes." - even if Brand ABC spends $0 in advertising. Upwork most likely uses a similar approach, and this is only my speculation, it makes natural sense for Upwork to show what they think is best for the client vs freelancer. And since there's so many different factors with clients - Overall Spend, what tier of plan they are on, where they are located, I can see how there should be two different results - and those are just the basics, I'd imagine they change search rankings based on time of the day, whether or not the freelancer is available, etc...

But again, my biggest concern is when I search for talent, the actual qualified talents are on page 20+. And the least qualified talents are filling pages 1 to 10.

[the-right-writer]

The search engine results should be the same when using the exact same parameters simultaneously. I have a friend help me with this, so we log in at the same exact time from two different computers from the same location. I search as a freelancer, and my friend searches as a client. The friend has never had anything from Upwork on his computer. 

In addition to the search results being different and wild swings from 100 JSS to 85 to 97, and worse, the freelancers can't see the projects that are listed between freelancer listings. I don't have access to Upwork's data, so I can't say why they decided to do this, especially when they can't manage to filter out phone numbers or emails in the job ads. No one will even respond to me about increasing the number of characters in the field for a Boolean. Instead, they decide there should be two separate and unequal search engines.

One week clients can find me; the next, I am receiving messages outside of Upwork wanting to know why I am not listed on Upwork, which leads me to think there is a rotating program ? or maybe someone is sitting there in real time playing with the listing. It's not like we'll ever know. I'm doing better with clients who couldn't find me on Upwork than on Upwork at the moment with the dearth of real jobs. So, maybe I should be thanking Upwork for sending clients away.

[calado-marco]

You've touched an important point " I search as a freelancer, and my friend searches as a client. The friend has never had anything from Upwork on his computer. " To get the full results allong with work history and portofolio, you need to enter in upwork as a subscriber. If you don't then the results are different.

At least that's my experience. Another thing that i've noticed is, since i use google, duck duck and thor browser on on-line searches (just to find different images - mostly png's), the results are also different. I don't know how this applys to UpWork, but due to the different search engines, and the way they work, i wouldn't be surprised that the same would also apply to UW.

Wha't i started to do is along with the job proposal's is sending a link to my personal portofolio, regardless of UW saying that our profile is been send along.

[ericaandrews]

This is one of the reasons UW claims it 'rotates' profiles in the search engine: To 'give' new freelancers a 'chance' to be seen.  Well, unfortunately, most clients are not on here to simply 'give' somebody a 'chance' and to create jobs just to be creating jobs.  Most new, legitimate clients are coming on here expecting to find the 'Top Rated' talent they see advertised on the Upwork TV commerical.  However, if a new client does a search and find pages and pages of people with no experience, ratings, or earnings, they are quickly going to LEAVE and think those TV commercials/ads are 'bait and switch' click-bait nonsense.   I understand the idea of UW wanting to be charitable and 'help' out freelancers just getting started, but if the end result is that all the clients are simply leaving and not hiring because the first 10-20 pages of search results are filled with freelancers with no ratings, earnings, or JSS scores, then it's really 'helping' nobody at all and hurting everybody.  

I've even done a search were I saw a profile of a freelancer 'ranked' higher than mine in the search results - the freelancer that had a 'Rising Talent' badge, but had no earnings and no current or past UW jobs on her profile.  Her upwork 'job history' was completely empty, but somehow had a 'Rishing Talent' badge

Now, why was a freelancer given a  'Rising Talent' badge without working any jobs but other freelancers have worked 5-10 jobs and can't get a straight answer as to when they'll get a badge or what more the need to do to obtain one?  It's almost like rolling the dice in Vegas.  The lack of transparency is just inappropriate, and constantly being told by moderators UW cannot 'disclose' how their algorithms work just makes people suspicious.  In my experience, when somebody cannot 'disclose' something, it's because there's something going on that shouldn't be going on.

[tomzilla1]

I understand what you're saying CJA - and I'm glad I wasn't the only one who searched and the results were just bunch of non sense profiles. I've seen a bunch of $0 top rated or raising talent too, at first I thought ok, maybe they just signed up maybe a few days ago and Upwork hasn't yet updated their earnings or they haven't withdraw any money yet to be counted as earnings. 

As for mods can't disclose how algorithm works - to an extent yes, they can't, either because they don't fully know (since they didn't write the algorithm), and/or they are only sharing the things they are allowed to share. For example, bottlers at most Coca Cola factories know the "secret formula" but they signed their life away in a contract if they disclose even a letter of the secret formula Coca Cola will be after them. 

We have common ground: first 1 to 10 pages should not show people with $0 earnings or a more accurate way to list the results I think is first 1 to 10 pages should not show the bottom 50-80% of the freelancers. Pages 1 to 3 should be reserved only for the top 0.1% to 5% freelancers, by a combo of earnings, hours, success rate, reviews, jobs taken on, etc. That's the basics - that's what I'd expect as a client if I hire. I don't want to go to page 25 to 30 to find top talent... that's like 30 minutes. From an user experience perspective, if an user (client this case) cannot find what they're looking for (top talent) in say 3 to 5 minutes... Based on my work on UI/UX, landing page best practices, more than 80% of the users (clients) will abandon the search and look elsewhere. But, I don't know UW's data so I can't say.

When they told me they rotate, I thought they meant freelancers who are actually worth clients' time. Like they rotate my profile in a bucket of similar profiles, so I understood it being ok, that's not too bad, if I was the underdog, but still have a pretty good profile and a long track record of success and reviews and earnings, I'd be grateful to have this rotation. But what you said opened my mind a bit - what if they meant rotating everybody's profile, including the $0's etc. Then it wouldn't make much sense, not to the freelancer, not to the client, and not to Upwork (since their model is % of the project from the freelancer, so it's actually in their best interest to show the freelancer that close big contracts first).

Above my paygrade.

[ericaandrews]

Believe it or not, the 'earnings' that show on a freelancer's profile have nothing to do with how much the freelancer has withdrawn.  As soon as the payment from the client completes the 1-2 week 'security freeze' and posts to the freelancer's  UW account, it is 'credited' toward the earnings that show on their profile. A freelancer can actually leave the money there up to 6 months, if they choose.  However, based on one of the criteria for getting a Rising Talent badge : "consistent good performance on projects" (or something like that), it's absolutely impossible to give a freelancer 'credit' for 'good performance' on UW projects if they've never even been hired even once.   It makes me wonder if people aren't being allowed to 'buy' badges or have 'friends' at UW that are adding badges to their profiles to 'help' them out.  If a freelancer has worked NO jobs, they should not have a badge or a Job 'success' score of any kind showing on their profile.

Again, I understand what is basically the CHARITY of Upwork trying to help new freelancers be 'seen', but that is a complete odds with what SELLS to clients.  When I started on UW a few years ago, my profile was consistently lower in search results behind others that had built a reputation on the platform, and I think that was fair.  There was no profile 'rotating' and Upwork didn't do special favors to help you 'be seen'.  You either EARNED the attention of clients, or you didn't get any.  Just like real life. Clients do not hire just to 'create jobs' for people that need them. Businesses exist to MAKE MONEY, not to 'create jobs' for people.  It's the new freelancer's job to convince clients that their talents are of value and can make/save the client money. 

Money is generated when clients come to the site, are 'impressed' with somebody and HIRE:  That's how freelancers get their money and Upwork gets its 'fees'.  However, if a new client sees the site for the first time and is NOT impressed with the first few pages of freelancers in their search, they LEAVE, and Upwork  gets no money through any fees from hiring or memberships paid by the client.   Upwork is Losing money by making a BAD 'first impression' with new clients by flooding the first few search pages with 'new' freelancers that don't have the badges/ratings that Upwork is advertising in their TV commericals.   

This is why when you pass most car dealerships, they put the stuff that catches people's EYE out on the parking lot to lure in customers from the street, and keep the 'economy' car models somewhere in the back.  Even though the client my end up actually buying one of the 'economy' models ultimately, you have to get them on the LOT first and get them to stay and browse around first.  If they are 'unimpressed' and don't come on the lot at all, or leave immediately, you've lost the sale.

Also, some of these profiles simply are not READY to be featured in the search engine.  I see so many profiles in the search that are Incomplete: Have no picture, or the freelancer didn't even bother to create a 'headline' for the services they provide, or even worse, the headline is riddled with typos and grammatical errors, which makes everybody look bad.  Or their profile is filled with a bunch of childish and unprofessional emoticons all over the place.  This is supposed to be a professional site, and profiles that are unprofessional and unpolished should be hidden from the search results until the freelancer completes them or cleans them up.   The same way Upwork 'reviews' and approves Project Catalogs before they can 'go live' and be seen by clients is what they need to do with profiles of new freelancers: The profile needs to be reviewed and APPROVED before it can go up the first time to make sure they look professional and the freelancer is actually offering skills for which there is a current NEED on the platform.  They need to put more emphasis on QUALITY on both sides (Quality clients AND Quality freelancers) instead of allow any and everybody that can click a mouse to Post a profile or Post a Job.

If UW attracts/keeps more quality clients, the newer freelancers will eventually get hired as a 'side effect' of those clients showing up and 'browsing' around anyway, but to attract the clients into the 'store' you have to sell bwhat sells, which are all those 'top rated', 'expert vetted', and 'rising talent' profiles Upwork advertises on the TV commercials that clients are expecting to see when they get here for the first time.   I've seen freelancers with Job Success Scores of 40-50% showing in the first page and things like that.  That is not how you attract and keep a client's attention.  I would leave the site within 2-3 minutes if I came on here to hire for the first time, and the first options I was shown were folks with no experience or terrible job success scores because I would feel my time was being wasted and the platform didn't have the 'talent' that it advertised. 

[tomzilla1]

A year ago I was told there is a rotating thing. So your profile might be further up, or further down. I was told by Upwork. Not sure if it's still accurate.

What I was referring to is for example, maybe Upwork sorts talents differently for a paid client account vs a free one. Or maybe an Enterprise client gets to see the best talents first (makes sense and I hope that's the case, but honestly I haven't seen many Enterprise accounts, maybe they aren't looking for marketing) And then some Enterprise level clients aren't Enterprise, I don't know the process or fees but my guess is naturally any membership based service is tier based. So AMEX for example, you have the Green, Gold, Platinum, and Black Centurion. Fees go from free to $5,000 a year. Perks varies wildly too though they changed the benefits for Black Centurion this year and it's exactly like my Platinum, which is only $695 a year.

Anyways, using that as an example I was hoping to explain maybe that's why there's so much variation. But in any case, I think Upwork has a "swarm of new/maybe fake freelancer profile" and has yet to fully address that, maybe it's technically almost impossible. Imagine if there's like 100k signups a day of fake freelancer profiles that passes all the automated checks.

But we have common ground: $0 earnings should never be on first 1,2,3,....10 pages, no matter what tier client account is. If you think about it, a client, no matter a one man show, or a Fortune 500, they're probably going to sign up with a free account to scope things out, and if they don't see any top talent, why would they upgrade? Or maybe that's the issue? Show them nothing so they can upgrade? Who knows just a wild guess.

I think it's in everyone's interest to show clients best talents first, no matter if they pay or not, and if they want to contact that top talent or EV even, then they got to pay the membership fee. Most clients don't even know what EV is, because EV is only shown to Enterprise, so they assume Top Talent is the best there is, and if you made $1000 you are top talent or something low like that.

[00137e0a]

This is extremely unusual, and I'm wondering if it's related to the significant decrease in my proposals/replies ratio. A few months ago, whenever I sent proposals, I could almost always count on receiving at least one response the next morning. Now it appears that my proposals are being sucked into a black hole.

I don't have any hard evidence, but I believe it has something to do with the implementation of the boosting system and changes to their best match algorithms.

I'm getting worried about this because, between proposals and invites, I was getting a steady job schedule from Upwork, and now I'm not getting invites, and my proposals appear to be going completely unnoticed.

Oh, and I've heard many people, both here and on Reddit, raise this issue, including veterans who earned hundreds of thousands of dollars on Upwork. So, whatever changes they made to their algorithms are affecting everyone.

[ericaandrews]

The "edited for community guidelines" you are getting is not a 'system error', but a Moderator deliberately removing the image you posted so others cannot see it. There is nothing you are doing or anything wrong with the image that causes that error.  It's very simple: If a Moderator doesn't like something a freelancer posts or says, or if a freelancer posts something deemed to 'unfavorable', they simply remove it and take it down or 'bury' the report deep down into the 'Support' forum by 'merging' it into the comments of some unrelated post where nobody will see it.

Your best bet is to post it to one of the outside social media forums for Upwork that is free of the censorship

[tomzilla1]

I think they are decently fair in terms of censorship. I haven't seen any unreasonable censorship from UW. I've seen them censoring out personal info - that's expected, privacy these days is not just a personal preference but a legal matter. As big as UW is, they will probably see a complaint from some govt agency if they don't crack the whips on that.

And honestly that's all I've seen over the years. In terms of TOS and all that - UW can do whatever they please, they can censor, delete, ban -- for any reason or no reason at all, just like employment laws. We're using UW's property to communicate ideas/report issues. It's their right to give us access or no access as they please.

But I understand frustration happens - it happens to everyone, I just hope that UW will continue to read our feedback and improve the search. Who knows it might already work perfectly for clients.

[kochubei_valeria]

Hi Jeanne, 

I'd like to reiterate what I shared earlier here and included screenshots. There are NOT two separate systems for talent search page. We've been trying to replicate the behavior you're describing but haven't been able to. Our engineers also confirmed that that page works the same. Without further details such as a screenshot or screen recording, we cannot further investigate. 

I'd also like to add that while moderators would remove any content that violates our Community Guidelines, and freelancer profiles being shared without their consent, you can include screenshots in your post any blur any information that may be sensitive or identifying.